"Watch out, Perry! The black hole will pull us in if we continue on this course!"
"So?"
"Huh?"
Perry lounged in the ship's cabin, one arm dropping over one rest, his eyes half-closed. "What's the fuss about that, Randy?"
"It's a black hole."
"And?"
"And that's bad."
"Oh?" Perry's head rolled till he could look straight at Randolph, his co-pilot. "Have you ever been in one?"
"No. Nobody has."
"Exactly."
It was an exploration ship, after all. Most of a mile of sensors, thrusters, reactors, and provisions for the two pilots confined to the single cabin investigated anything that seemed worth investigating. Not black holes. Everyone knew what those were.
"Don't we know what those are?"
"No more than we do about the rest of this stuff. We have telescopes. We have unmanned probes. We're out here to make sure."
"Yeah. OK. Yeah. Punch it."
The two pilots regained awareness in a vestibule. They remembered nothing about leaving their ship, but there they were.
"Well, Randy? How was it?"
"I don't even remember. Let's go through that door, maybe find something to report."
Perry eased open the smaller, presumably interior door, and saw chaos. Unimaginable chaos. Aliens with six arms hung from two or three chandeliers at once, a line of dancers with anywhere from three to eight legs each kicked up its many heels in time with the bouncy intergalactic band on the anti-gravity stage, and partiers carried on all over the floor, the walls, the transparent ceiling, and every surface of the room above visible beyond it.
"I admit that I'm a little surprised," Perry said. "Isn't there a fire marshal around?"
"Ha!" A mass of crystal which had extended part of itself into a single gigantic arm for holding a keg vibrated in amusement. "Nobody like that could make it in here. This place is for cool guys and gals only. Like you two. How do I know you're cool when I've never seen your species before? Because you're here, that's how. Come on in!"
Perry and Randy grinned at each other. "Don't mind if we do."
Finis
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